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Council Members Komives, Adams, Harper and Riley
Title
Amending Chapter 554, "Discrimination Prohibited" of the Toledo Municipal Code, to include a prohibition against discrimination on the basis of Natural Hair Types, Hairstyles and Head Wraps Commonly Associated with Race, Culture or Religion.
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SUMMARY & BACKGROUND:
In the United States, Eurocentric races, ethnicities, and cultures have been historically and traditionally accepted as the racial, ethnic, and cultural norms, and other American communities have been historically and traditionally marginalized in American culture as a result. Dating from the days of slavery, natural hair types, hairstyles and head wraps commonly associated with race, culture and religion have frequently been the focus of intentional as well as unintended discrimination against those individuals, based on negative, lingering, cultural biases that frequently favor hair styles and hair types that more closely resemble Eurocentric hair types and hair styles. . Discrimination toward natural hairstyles and types and head wraps commonly associated with race, culture or religion stigmatizes and creates undue burdens in professional settings.
The Good Hair Study in 2016 by the Perception Institute found that Black women feel more anxiety regarding their hair and feel more pressure to straighten their hair for work than white women do. The majority of people, regardless of demographics, feel negatively towards women of color (specifically Black women) based on their hair. This study also showed that this is a result of social conditioning and can be undone through positive representation and education, and millennials of all races feel more positively toward natural hair than the older generations. Grooming or appearance policies that ban, limit, or otherwise restrict natural hair types, hairstyles or head wraps commonly associated with racial, cultural and religious identities violate the intent and spirit of Toledo's anti-d...
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